


the greatest castles are built over human bones

by mysticalmusicwhispers



Series: Ponderous Thoughts (a hetalia drabble series) [3]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: 3rd person, Cold War, Cold War Mention, Gen, Genocide, Internment Camp Mention, Mention of Native American Oppression, Native American Oppression, Slavery, Slavery mention, a lot of dark things are mentioned in Very vague terms, genocide mention, internment camp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-15 10:55:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29063187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mysticalmusicwhispers/pseuds/mysticalmusicwhispers
Summary: When they look at Alfred F. Jones, they smile, and they know the world will be okay.They don’t see much.
Series: Ponderous Thoughts (a hetalia drabble series) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2131374
Kudos: 4





	the greatest castles are built over human bones

**Author's Note:**

> Reposted from my [tumblr](https://mysticalmusicwhispers.tumblr.com)! ([original post](https://mysticalmusicwhispers.tumblr.com/post/635445367342792704/it-is-hating-americas-hypocrisy-day-in-here-so))
> 
> Inspired a lot by the wonderful series[Le Code de l'indigénat](https://archiveofourown.org/series/218501) by [lunicole](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunicole/pseuds/lunicole) and F. Scott Fitzgerald's _The Great Gatsby_.
> 
> Feedback is very welcome and appreciated! Historical notes at the end for accuracy/context.

When they look at him, they don’t see much.

They see a boy, forever nineteen, who has the vitality of eternal summer pulsing through his veins; they see a young man, larger than life when he bounds into the room, with eyes the color of the sky and hair the color of the sun; they see a young nation, who has grown into the leader they never thought he could be, champion of the world, protector of the poor. In the constellations of freckles on his cheeks they see a million sparkling pinpricks of hope, and in his star-spangled gaze they see a whole universe of possibility. They see liberty, and freedom, and a beacon of hope for the downtrodden and oppressed. They see a hero—the embodiment of good, of light, of the triumphs of justice. When they look at Alfred F. Jones, they smile, and they know the world will be okay.

They don’t see much.

They don’t see the black sunspots, the occasional flickers of a darker past tucked away under sun gilded hair and radiant smiles so bright they blind. They don’t see the wars—the blood, the unnamed civilians, the deep, deep scars; no, they do not see the wars that smashed up people and nations like porcelain plates, shattered into fragments, sharp and cold. ( _Cold—he said the war was cold, although it scorched and seared, and reeked of death, and division._ ) They do not see the hypocrisy— _after all, self-determination is only for the ones he thinks deserves it, and rebellion is only glorious when the new order sees him as a god_. They do not see the ignorance, the indifference, and how he looks away—genocides upon genocides, Rwanda, Cambodia, the piles of dead— _he always has the privilege to look away_. And beneath that, they forgot the discrimination, of beady eyes and suspicious glares, of internment camps, immigration laws, inequality. ( _He is one, out of many—e pluribus unum, he says, a nation of opportunity, fairness, tolerance—except when the doors closed on the people who came too late, the people deemed unfit to climb to the top, or to come to his shores at all._ ) And beneath everything, they forget the _other_ legacy of colonial America, not the one of beautiful revolution, and freedom, and liberty, but the legacy of slavery ( _proudly American since 1638_ ), of the Trail of Tears, of the ousting of Native Americans. They do not see this, and it is not entirely their fault, but—

There is always ugliness in beauty, and the greatest castles are built over human bones.

**Author's Note:**

> Historical Notes
> 
>  **Rwandan Genocide** : systemic killings of the Tutsi minority of Rwanda in the 1990s. The Tutsi were separated from the Hutu majority because they raised livestock instead of growing crops for a living, which was what the Hutu did; this was an unnecessary economic division that was furthered by German and Belgian colonization.  
> The international community had lots of forewarning that the genocide would happen but didn't take action, and the US and UN had the power to stop it but did nothing. In fact, the US actively advocated for nonintervention (under Bill Clinton's presidency).
> 
>  **Cambodia Khmer Rouge** : a regime that ruled Cambodia for 4 years under Communist leader Pol Pot. Nearly a quarter of Cambodia's population was killed in a genocide carried out by the Khmer Rouge; they targeted intellectuals, people with associations to the former regime, ethnic minorities, etc. The genocide ended when (Communist) Vietnam invaded Cambodia. Cambodia also fought the Cambodian-Vietnam War against Vietnam.  
> At the start of the regime, the US told certain countries (aka China) to support Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge regime and literally “closed [their] eyes when some others did something for Pol Pot.” (quote from Wikipedia, original source is a Charlie Rose video) This was mostly because the US, swept up in panic about Communism, thought Vietnam was a threat, and saw Cambodia as a blockade to that threat.
> 
>  **Slavery in the US** : the first slave trading ship from the US set out in 1637 from Marblehead, Massachusetts, and there were accounts of slaves owned by settlers [as early as 1638](https://www.npr.org/2016/06/21/482874478/forgotten-history-how-the-new-england-colonists-embraced-the-slave-trade) (also in Massachusetts).


End file.
